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At 1pm EST today, Apple will hold a press event that, if Apple’s soaring, unalloyed performance is anything to go by, and in the words of the master himself, will change everything. The problem is, no one really knows what will be announced today; we know it’s iPhone-related, we know that it will be Tim Cook’s first keynote delivery since Steve Jobs’ departure… and that’s it.

Everything else is pure speculation — and if you read any definitive, insider reports about the iPhone 5 being announced today, they’re lying. The fact is, an iPhone will be released, but it could very easily be a cheaper, “sidegrade” iPhone 4S; a stopgap until the iPhone 5 is ready. The iPhone 4S is expected to look the same as the iPhone 4, but feature the newer A5 processor (found in the iPad 2), possibly more RAM (1GB), and a lower price point (the 64GB iPhone 4S will cost around the same as today’s 32GB iPhone 4). There’s a strong chance that this is the only iPhone that will be announced today.

Today will also see the announcement of iOS 5, which will power the new iPhone when it’s released sometime in October, and will probably end up being the centerpiece of the keynote. There’s no doubt that Apple held back some of iOS 5’s key features when it was released to developers in June — and the faster processor and increased RAM inside the iPhone 4S could indicate that we’re about to see the release of Apple’s voice-control “Assistant.”

Assistant — or Apple Assistant, or Virtual Personal Assistant, or whatever it ends up being called — will bring, at long last, speech-to-text to iOS devices. If you’re used an Android smartphone or tablet, you will have used Google’s built-in voice search — and, at its most basic, this is what Assistant will do for iOS. As the name suggests, though, this piece of software will do a whole lot more. For a start, it will bring system-wide voice control — “launch Angry Birds”, “check email” — but because the software is based on Siri, an app (and underlying technology) that Apple acquired in April for a rumored $200 million, we know that Assistant will be so much more.

In the words of Siri’s co-founder, Norman Winarsky, including Assistant in iOS 5 will be a “world-changing event.” Perhaps he attended the same school as Jobs, maybe he’s just naturally hyperbolic, but either way, it’s a claim worth investigating. Basically, Assistant isn’t just some speech recognition technology; it is, in the words of Steve Jobs, “artificial intelligence”… pocketable artificial intelligence for the pristine masses. Assistant, if it works as advertised, will be like the computer in Star Trek. You’ll be able to ask Assistant for the nearest place to get a cup of earl grey, or the best pizza parlor — and yes, it will even manage restaurant reservations for you. It will change how you interact with your iPhone, and it will change how you interact with the world.

Ultimately, though, nothing is guaranteed until Tim Cook actually bounces onto the stage in a couple of hours and lets loose. It wouldn’t behoove a company of Apple’s stature to convene a major event to announce a cheaper price point or more RAM, though — so if the Big Reveal is built-in Assistant in iOS 5, it will be a seriously impressive piece of software, and we’ll of course write more about it later. It wouldn’t be surprising if Tim Cook rounds off the event by unveiling a couple more exciting features in iOS 5, too — and perhaps a Sprint-exclusivity deal for the iPhone 4S, but that’s just a rumor at the moment.

It’s also possible that the iPhone 4S might just be a big smokescreen for a monstrously-powerful, 4-inch edge-to-edge screened iPhone 5. It doesn’t feel like the right time for an entirely-new iPhone, though. The iPhone 4 still has a competitive form factor that’s selling by the millions, and except for its external, “death grip” antenna — a problem that could be fixed with an iPhone 4S — there’s no reason to rush an iPhone 5 to market. There’s nothing wrong with merely increasing the performance and providing an entirely new input paradigm — it’s just a matter of whether omg-shiny! gadget-idolizing zealots see it the same way.

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